A popular anti-stalking bill has become snarled in a behind-the-scenes Senate dispute over a Democratic proposal that would broaden the measure to prohibit people convicted of domestic violence from possessing firearms.

The struggle threatens to plunge the Senate into the kind of fight over gun control that Republican leaders have been trying to avoid as the election approaches.

It is the type of issue that "blows this place up," Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., observed last week as he attempted to force a vote on the anti-stalking bill without having to schedule a vote on guns.

The problem is made even more politically acute because the gun controls would be imposed in the name of curbing spousal and child abuse, another cause with wide political appeal.

Many lawmakers are not eager to choose between offending the powerful National Rifle Association, which opposes the gun proposal, and voting against legislation aimed at curbing domestic violence.

Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg, D-N.J. -- who is seeking to add the gun proposal to the anti-stalking bill introduced by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas -- is not making the choice any easier.

Republicans, he said, are saying they will not consider legislation unless it "passes the NRA test."

Under Lautenberg's proposal, anyone convicted of a crime involving domestic violence, including misdemeanors, would be barred by federal law from owning or possessing a firearm.

While federal law now prohibits most convicted felons from possessing guns, Lautenberg argues that, because of plea bargaining or "anachronistic attitudes or laws," many serious domestic-violence cases are handled as misdemeanors, which do not trigger the federal gun ban.

Hutchison's bill would make it a federal felony if a stalker crosses state lines to intimidate or threaten a person and puts the victim in fear of death or serious bodily injury.

It also would extend federal anti-stalking protections to a victim's family, to people who live or work on federal property and to individuals who are being stalked by individuals other than their spouses or former spouses.